It would prevent the government from using settlement money from civil cases for purposes other than direct victim compensation or remediation, like cleanups of environmental disasters. “Having been twice spurned by lawmakers, the Obama administration leveraged the Volkswagen settlement,” the groups charged. All settlement money, they argued, should “instead be deposited into the U.S. Treasury.”The groups said that Congress has not authorized or provided money for electric vehicle infrastructure. At times, the government has ordered a polluter to pay for unrelated environmental restoration projects as restitution; the attorney general’s order would prohibit such deals. “What’s wrong with that?”Advertisement Continue reading the main storyMr. Sessions’ new policy directs Justice Department lawyers not to include similar payments in settlements with corporations.

Source: New York Times June 10, 2017 01:20 UTC